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Calette knelt at the midpoint of the bridge beside the rail, heedless of her rumpled silk skirts and the braids that had come loose from their silver pins. Twisted awkwardly, she could maneuver both head and shoulders between the carved posts. Occasional passersby cast odd looks her way, she didn’t notice. She was lost in the sun-dappled waters of the river Aris.

Long ago, the posts of the balustrade had been carved to resemble notable members of the House that had built the bridge. You could see hints of faces here and there – a sharp nose, a dimpled chin, a mouth twisted into an ingratiating smile. The rest worn into obscurity by time and weather. No one remembered who they were anymore. Calette, when she was little, had made up names for them, and tried to guess how each one was related to the next. But even those apocryphal identities were lost to them now.

She had chosen this sparsely traveled bridge for her quest because she knew there would be few travelers to disturb her. There were more convenient bridges along the Aris, and more picaresque ones too. Only those who were lost would come this way, or those on quests of their own. She would be left alone. That, and the spaces in the balustrade that were just wide enough room for a slender, sixteen-year-old girl to lean through if she sought an unimpeded view of the river below.

Illumination was the purpose of her quest.

The river was full of the light. With the sun high overhead and the summer sky nearly white with heat, the luminous current was an ever-changing panorama that Calette sought to memorize. It wasn’t, she realized, something most people paid attention to. The structure of light. The way it moved upon the water – or through the water. Transparent one moment, opaque the next. She wanted to learn it, to remember it, so she could paint it.

As she stared into the river, she kept her eyes open, not even blinking. To close her eyes even for an instant would separate her from the light she sought to know. So she let herself become mesmerized by its movement, let it fill her awareness until she forgot everything but the light. Adrift in shifting patterns of light and dark, she even forgot about her body in its awkward perch on the bridge. Dissolving, she thought. Soon, she herself would be nothing but light…

“Your pardon? This is the Drennan Bridge?”

The richly accented voice splintered Calette’s concentration. She dragged her gaze away from the water to squint at the young man crouched beside her. Sparkling.

“What?” The sparkles were disconcerting. Feeling strange and disconnected, she wondered briefly if he were real, or some dream sent to her by Thest.

“I said, ‘can you help me’.” The apparition smiled at her. Judging by bemused expression on his face, he had been there for some time, trying to get her attention. “What did you see in the river that was so fascinating?”

She pressed her fingertips against her eyelids, awareness gradually trickling back through her senses. “Nothing. Everything.” The sensation of being permeated with light dissipated. When she looked at him again, the spots of light in her vision were mostly gone. The only sparkles left were those from the gems in his ears, winking at her through the blond curls. “I know who you are,” she realized suddenly.

He seemed surprised, and something subtle in him shifted. “I did not realize I was famous already,” he said. His casual expression masked an inner tension, more felt than seen.

“On the boat,” she told him, disappointed that he wasn’t some dream or vision after all. She squirmed to free herself from between the posts. One of them grabbed at her hair with a carved elbow as she wriggled past, pulling lose the last silver pin. It dropped away, one last fluttering sparkle before it disappeared into the river. Sighing, she untangled her feet from her skirts, smoothed the subtle violet silk, stood. “When you knocked Cael into the river.”

He laughed and rose to stand beside her, wariness gone in an instant. “Oh, that! You were in the boat? I am surprised I did not notice you. I almost always notice the pretty girls. You will have to excuse me for being too distracted just then.”

She feigned a smile, but paid little heed to his unsubtle flattery. Her mind was filled with light, still, even if her eyes weren’t, and she wanted to remember it. More to the point, how could she capture the effect in paint? She could see the hues she would need in her head, but how to ask the pigment-maker for them? She was fairly certain there was no pigment named “glint” or “glimmer.”

“So…you are a friend of Cael’s?”

“Not exactly.” Perhaps she was approaching it wrong. Maybe it had more to do with the colors one left off the canvas instead of the ones you put on.She caught at one of the fallen braids, tugged at it absently.

“Good. I hope that means you and I can be friends.”

The young Jurati – she couldn’t remember if she’d ever heard his name – was not distracted now. Somehow, he had ended up closer to her, though she would swear that he hadn’t moved at all. So close she could taste the spice of his last meal on his breath. So close that she could see the each of the hairs in the golden down that lined his chin. And on his chest, too, where his open-necked shirt revealed far more than any proper Corregan would dream of. So close that when the light caught his eyes…

She caught her breath in her throat. Those eyes. Standing there on the bridge, the same light danced across his hazel eyes that had danced across the surface of the water. No one in Evreme had eyes so light, so it had never occurred to her to look in such a place for the colors she was seeking. But here it was in front of her, the very a palette she was seeking, in the eyes of a foreigner. Who was she to deny that the hands of the Broken God might sometimes reach out to those in need?

When she spoke, she had to keep her voice low to control the shaking. “What is it you want?”

“Only to spend some time in your company—”

She threw up a hand, pressed her fingers against his lips to silence him. “No, no. Why did you stop here. To speak to me now?” She lowered her hand again, but kept her eyes locked on his, light-touched, studying them with the same intensity as she had watched the water.

Somehow, he managed to look both canny and abashed at the same time when he told her. “I need of directions. This city …” He waved a hand, encompassing the entire maze of bridges and terraced streets that made up Corregal. “All these bridges. I admit I am lost. I must have crossed this bridge a twelve times before I decided I must ask for help.”

There were one hundred and twenty-seven bridges, crossing the two rivers. Even Calette, having lived here her whole life, could not claim to know the city’s every turning. It did not surprise her that someone so new here would lose his way. She allowed a little sympathy to share her awe at her discovery. “Where are you supposed to be?”

“Drennan Bridge?” He pulled a small, cloth-wrapped packet from his belt, and a slip of paper that he held out to her. “Sieur Eristan asked me to deliver this.”

She glanced briefly at the writing on the paper, then back up into his remarkable hazel eyes once again. “This is Drennan Bridge,” she told him, “but it’s the wrong Drennan Bridge.”

“The wrong…” With a groan, the young foreigner slumped against the railing. “Are you telling me there are two Drennan Bridges in this thrice-cursed city?”

“Three, actually.” Calette nibbled on the end of her braid, seeing an opportunity in his consternation. “It’s a… quirk. The one you want is over the Cille.” The story of the Drennan ones was a long one, several generations in the making, but she didn’t think he was interested in the details just now. He had come a long way out of his way to reach this Drennan Bridge, coming from Sieur Eristan’s House. She wondered who had given him his directions. Or if, indeed, some otherworldy hand had reached out to lead him to her. “I can take you there…” she said, saw his expression brighten in response. “But you have to come with me somewhere first.”

His smile deepened. “You’re not going to lead me off to seduce me, are you?”

She felt herself blush. Belatedly, she realized she had given him entirely the wrong impression, gazing so intently into his eyes. He was Jurati, for goodness sake! The islanders’ worship of the heretical Fourth Hand gave dispensation for all manner of licentious behavior, her father said. This one, bold enough to wear Aratanne’s symbol on a chain around his neck, probably thought she was besotted with him.

“It’s not safe.” She blurted out the first excuse she could think of to explain herself. His eyebrow quirked a question. “Where we’re going. It’s not safe. You have a sword. For protection.”

“Ah,” he said, one hand automatically moving to the hilt at his waist. He smiled still. “So I do. And I would be happy to escort you wherever it is you need to go, ailenia. But perhaps you will do one small favor for me first?”

She hesitated. He was probably jesting about the seduction, but the truth was she was desperate for the light he carried in his eyes she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t give in to his advances, if he made any.

The character previously known as Mariesa Fleuracy will hereafter be known as Nedalya Fleuracy, or Neda for short.

My reasons for this have to do with the changing nature of the story. When she first entered this story world, some 10 years ago, she was nothing more than remembered Object of Affection. “Mariesa” was a good enough name at the time, though I never really liked it. Now that the character has evolved into a more significant role and become a person in her own right, I felt she needed a name with more weight behind it. Ergo the change.

I’m really particular about names.

(I’ll be changing the past entries to reflect the name change in the very near future.)

And then there was art!

I coerced my teen daughter into drawing some character sketches for me and, with only a brief rundown of basic attributes, this is what she gave me:

Barris, Romeric, Neda and Tierce, by Lucy W.

I think she did a great job of capturing my four main characters, aside from the fact that they all look about five years too young. Romeric, especially, looks about 12 years old here. But

But it’s a start at getting some visual representation of these characters! But I think the personality conveyed in each expression is right on.